The Arkansas Supreme Court allowed Circuit Judge Tim Fox's order on the case to stand in regards only to the three specific plaintiffs who filed suit, while staying the more general application of Fox's judgment to encompass other same-sex Arkansans in the same situation. If the court drags its heels on the issue, other parents seeking relief in Arkansas might themselves have to sue.

In Florida, plaintiffs have gone the federal route. The Advocate:

The couples and Equality Florida filed suit in August, but last week they added a request for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida to make the order to the state without a trial, according to a press release from the National Center for Lesbian Rights, which is representing them along with Florida attorneys.

“There is no justification for Florida’s refusal to treat same-sex spouses equally,” said NCLR senior staff attorney Amy Whelan in the press release. “The Supreme Court has already ruled that same-sex spouses and their children have a constitutional right to have their family relationships respected in every state.”

More by Benjamin Hardy

Hutchinson said Tuesday that the Graham-Cassidy bill "does not represent a significant cost-shift to the states." Yet several health care experts said the proposal would slash projected federal funds to Arkansas by billions of dollars.

An open line for a muggy day

Census data and unemployment figures show more jobs for Arkansans and less poverty. But the state still lags national figures by a wide margin, and income inequality keeps widening in Arkansas and everywhere.

I always scan the Little Rock City Board for items of interest this week and this one caught my eye: A zoning measure required by a proposal to tear down the IHOP at Markham and University.

What's purported to be a final-words essay from condemned prisoner Kenneth Williams was distributed today by Deborah Robinson, a freelance journalist in Arkansas. He reflects on his execution, his victims, reactions of inmates and big servings of fried chicken, which he says are given to all inmates on execution days.

In which I fix an overlooked speaker in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette's coverage of the observance of the 60th anniversary of Central High School desegregation

Diane Ravitch, a powerful voice against the billionaires trying to replace an egalitarian public education system with a fractured system of winners and losers segregated by race and income in private or privately operated schools, is giving a shoutout to Barclay Key of Little Rock for his review of Little Rock 60 years after the school crisis.